Dean's Council Meeting

College of Arts and Sciences

October 1, 2008

 

 

Present:  E. Boquet, M. Coleman, D. Keenan, M. Kubasik, P. Lane,D. McFadden,

J. Orman, L. Porter, D. Quintiliani, R. Rodrigues, G. Sauer, J. Shanahan, J. Simon,

M. Sourieau, D. Winn

 

Not Present: N. Dallavalle, J. McCarthy

 

The meeting convened at 3:30 p.m.

 

Welcome

The Dean introduced the newly appointed Assistant Dean, Dawn Quintiliani, to the department chairs. Ms. Quintiliani was previously the Assistant Dean in the Dean of Freshmen's Office at the University and has joined the College in a parallel position to Ms. Susan Peterson.

 

Minutes

Approval of Minutes—Dr. John Orman moved to approve the May 6 and September 10, 2008 minutes and Dr. Phil Lane seconded the motion. All were in favor of approval of minutes.

 

Discussion of future recording of Dean's Council Minutes—Lane asked the Council to consider a more condensed format for recording of the minutes. There was a disagreement with this request, because some found it extremely useful to have detailed records to share with members of his department. The current format of the minutes clearly explains the discussions that are relative to the entire College opposed to a brief outline of the agenda of the College. A suggestion was made to elaborate on minutes during meetings where a great amount of information would be presented opposed to meetings that would be conversational and/or developmental style, which is the intention for the majority of the Dean's Council meetings this year.

It was agreed that elaboration of the minutes will be recorded if the agenda warrants a more in-depth discussion providing the background or rationale of a particular decision. There could be two ways to elaborate on the minutes when necessary—the chairs could request to record more detail at a particular meeting or provide a written summary of what they communicated in the meeting for Ms. Jean Daniele to incorporate into the draft for approval. Minutes will consist of an outline listing key points and decisions or votes unless otherwise requested.

 

How Do/Can/Should Departments Work

The Dean's Council engaged in a discussion reflecting questions that were provided to them through the reading: Essential Skills for Academic Chairs. They shared exemplars of their experiences.

 

What is happening in a department that is "working well"?

 

Working Well

• Communication—"Good Chemistry"
• Work toward same mission
• Focus on Departmental Work within the department
• Generosity of spirit—stepping up to the plate rather than assigning tasks (leadership in place)
• Mutual respect
• No "factions"
• Indicators—when a department experiences a good search
• Learning new things
• Integration of Part-Time Faculty (adjuncts)
• Ritual celebrations/traditions
• Interpersonal knowledge/relationship building
• Ability to disagree respectfully
• Student camaraderie
• Good teaching and research
• Decision-making processes that leads to satisfaction
• Move on…
• Consensus preferred over voting—voting creates more of an attachment to positions rather than exploration of issues. They tend to remember who agreed and/or disagreed.
• Preparation and consultation (collective conversations) to gain as much consensus as possible within the department in terms of voting on a particular situation.
• Important to bridge consensus and voting
• Consensus is built through the open engagement of conflict not the avoidance of conflict.
• Voting is not problematic for departments working well together (respectful culture); voting will then become functional rather than the climate being dysfunctional.

• New faculty-satisfied
• Vision of where department sees itself going

 

The Generalization was that the departments focus in interesting ways on an orientation around work within the department.

 

 

Which of the ideas generated in response to question 1 are the most challenging areas in which to achieve success and/or cooperation?

 

Challenges

• Leadership shared across Department (Challenge of Delegating)—sharing in functions and the mission of the University relative to generosity of spirit and the challenge of delegating.
• Resentful delegating
• Refusal to share in leadership unless Merit compensation is attached
• Recruiting, mentoring, rank and tenure preparation
• Revolved around the time crunch of work
• Outcomes and interpersonal dynamics
• Institutional politics component
• "Normal" work hours-proximity to campus
• Evening events
• Weekend Preview Day
• Chair Resentment for carrying the load
• It is helpful to engage in departmental celebrations on a personal level giving a fuller picture of personal commitments, which helps in avoiding resentment
• Faculty "life cycle" (significant amount of retirement over the next few years)
• Departments are working well with leadership in place, but these orientations may not be shared by a new generation of colleagues who may have a different orientation to work. There are generational differences at many levels.
• During faculty life cycle there may be different levels of engagement.
• Junior colleagues are attempting to reach tenure that requires a certain level of diligence and support.
• Faculty emphasize the importance of various initiatives at different times, but essentially their jobs are similar in that teaching; research and service/leadership are their primary roles.
• Lack of timely information for planning participation
• A list of potential yearly events specifying the level of faculty participation is needed in advance, so faculty are aware of their role and are given the appropriate time for preparation.
• Having the information at hand makes the engagement more acceptable and/or feasible for faculty to commit.
• Yearly events requesting faculty assistance should be anticipated with a greater level of planning.
• Faculty seem to be the last to be notified in terms of requesting their assistance
• There is a difference in leadership for some of the annual events (such as Preview Day), which was previously run through Admissions and is now facilitated through Student Affairs. There may be changes to the way these events are orchestrated.
• Getting beyond past problems
• How best to motivate to next level
• In departments where faculty are meeting expectations, should the chair seek further motivation to generate increased development in terms of moving to the next level.
• Is it the chair's responsibility to obtain greater research out of their colleagues?
• Cultivate "critical mass"
• Obtain new faculty involvement, so that over time there is a critical mass. The colleagues not involved wonder what they are missing, which results in initiatives moving forward and positive changes occurring within the department without changing individual perspectives.
• Find "niche" for faculty so they are more receptive to engage in areas of interest and/or expertise.
• Is it the chairs role to play to the strengths of faculty members and at the same time develop areas where faculty are experiencing weaknesses?
• Should chairs reflect on their own strengths and weaknesses asking how they can help each other play to the strengths and strengthen the weaknesses?
• Chairs should take these conversations back into the departments directing the same questions to departmental colleagues.
• Program review—an opportunity for continual review and development—What are our goals and how can we get there? What was found to be useful with previous program reviews?
• Curriculum review
• Implementing recommendations
• Re-energized
• Strategically utilize the review
• Collaborative cohort review in the sciences was not found to be positive with the exception that the review determined the need for additional hires within the sciences.
• It is the entire University's responsibility to advance the mission of the institution and create an effective learning experience for our students and to maintain effective programs that are affordable to the University.

• Asking people to change their "mode"
• Engage in conversations to find out where colleagues are placing their energies in terms of responsibilities to the institution and development of their careers.
• Inter-generational and institutional change
• There are generational differences within the faculty and institutional changes that are viewed differently across generations, which result in tension among colleagues
• Chairs that have been in leadership roles for a very long time become frozen. There is a need to become more diverse calling for different leadership and decision making styles.
• What is the chair's role in managing faculty's ability to connect to institutional change?
• What gets "on the table" during Department meetings?
• How are department meetings handled?
• Business meetings with agenda
• Work meetings—coming together to focus on a particular problem as a team
• Meeting conversations to discuss and/or brain storm new ideas/changes
• Intellectual/pedagogical conversations
• Committees within departments
• Social gatherings
• What kind of work is being generated?
• What chair's skills should be differential in the various types of meetings?

 

 

Discussion of Chair Compensation Plan

The Dean distributed the College of Arts and Sciences Department Chair Compensation Plan for discussion. A collegial selection of chairs process and an appropriate compensation plan within the resources of the College is needed.

 

It was suggested that departments engage in a work-based conversation about how to meet their goals and that chairs be selected based on their ability to help the department move towards those goals. Chairs' compensations should be connected to specific agreed upon goals within department. Not all department chairs should be compensated equally, because the intensity of their responsibilities varies.

 

Issues relative to chairs compensation could be presented to faculty through the department chairs in an anticipation of a chairs election and/or a departmental proposal for the current chair or presented to the College faculty as a whole.

 

The question of the amount of the stipend arose in light of stipends received by DSB chairs. The Dean agreed to submit a request to increase chairs stipends from $4,500 to $7,500 on her 2010 budget request. An increase in chairs' stipends would be relative to reallocation of funds opposed to new funding.

 

The following revisions were agreed upon and will be included in the College of Arts and Sciences Governance and Department Chair Compensation as a footnote.

• Agreement not to inscribe a dollar amount for the chairs' stipend in the chair compensation plan document

• Agreement for the Dean to move forward and voice the need for a planful periodic increase in chairs' stipends
• Agreement that the Dean would indicate the value of periodic review of stipend amount in the chair compensation plan document
• Agreement that the Dean would advocate for increased stipends.

 

Planning Teams for the Remaining Dean's Council Meetings

The topic for the November Dean's Council meeting will be Hiring and Retention: Issues for women, members of diverse/historically under-represented U.S. groups, and international faculty. The planning team for the meeting is Beth Boquet, Robbin Crabtree, Will Johnson, Matthew Kubasik and Renee White.

 

Formation of Task Forces

• Periodic Program Review Planning—Drs. Boquet, Coleman and McFadden will develop a broad template for program reviews looking at what broad categories should be included in reviews and develop recommendations about a queue for determining when the various programs will be reviewed.
• College Governance Review—Drs. Keenan and Sauer will facilitate the College Governance review. The newly elected College Planning Committee will be asked to elect one or two faculty members to join this group.

 

These task forces will attempt to meet once a month in addition to working on subsets of projects in between these meeting.

 

Announcements

Registration Changes—Chairs were informed of the changes that will take place for spring 2009 class registration.

• The lottery system will be eliminated and switched to an alphabetical order giving students more of an opportunity to register early in the process over the period of their four years. The system will give each student one random alphabetical sequence for major and minor registration and then it will be reversed for the core and elective phase. Each semester the sequences will change.
• The electronic waitlist will be continued. This list will be shared with the department chairs and deans during the registration process. The wait list will be available for students as they register for the spring 2009 term until Friday, January 9.

 

Workflow for Program Assistant Annual Evaluations—Ms. Jean Daniele informed the department chairs that performance appraisals for program assistants will be implemented through a banner workflow process. She shared the following procedure/information:

 

• Human Resources will forward an electronic request directly to the supervisor one month prior to your assistants review

 

• Once the form is completed it should be forwarded to the Dean for approval, which is then forwarded to the AVP for final approval.

 

• Processing these forms timely is important, so the workflow process can be completed before their anniversary date.

 

• If the first chain of command is delayed, it holds up the whole process.

 

• Workflow only allows one supervisor to fill out the evaluation, and because some of our program assistants report to multiple departments and programs, Human Resources required a designated supervisor for processing. Ms. Daniele forwarded a list to Human Resources indicating the appropriate supervisor for each assistant.

 

• In situations, where chairs and directors are sharing an assistant, it is the responsibility of the designated supervisor to collaborate with the other departments and programs to assure everyone's input is represented.

 

The meeting adjourned at 5:30 p.m.